Illegal work arrests surge as police target ‘unscrupulous’ employers

Police arrest an undocumented worker in a nail bar in Belfast

Arrests for illegal work have surged this past year as police focus on “unscrupulous” employers who exploit undocumented migrants, the government says.

Immigration officers arrested more than 6,400 people in the past year in raids at businesses across the UK, data released by the Home Office shows. It said the figure is 51% higher than the previous year.

It did not provide numbers as to how many arrests led to charges, convictions or deportations.

It said immigration enforcement officials had “intensified” their work to “tackle those abusing the UK immigration system and exploiting vulnerable people”.

Officers had visited more than 9,000 businesses – among them restaurants, nail bars and construction sites – to check paperwork and working conditions.

Such businesses had often subjected migrants to “squalid conditions and illegal working hours” as well as below-minimum wages.

The Home Office said there were a range of industries exploiting migrant workers.

In one case in Surrey, officers arrested nine people at a caravan park who had been working as delivery drivers.

At one one major operation in March, officers arrested 36 people at a building site in Belfast’s Titanic Quarter. Some had breached visa conditions while others didn’t have working rights.

Immigration Enforcement director Eddy Montgomery said there were many cases where people travelling to the UK were “sold a lie by smuggling gangs that they will be able to live and work freely in the UK.

“In reality, they often end up facing squalid living conditions, minimal pay and inhumane working hours,” he said.

Dame Angela Eagle, the minister for border security and asylum, said the government would “continue to root out unscrupulous employers and disrupt illegal workers who undermine our border security”.

The government said it had also returned nearly 30,000 people over the past year who did not have the right to be in the UK.

It has said it is cracking down on illegal migration, setting out its plans in a White Paper to tighten work visas and those overstaying. It scrapped a special visa for care workers introduced during the pandemic, noting that this had been a pathway exploited by some.

There was mixed reaction to the plans, with some business sectors decrying the restrictions on work visas, while some Conservative opponents said the reforms didn’t go far enough to stop illegal migration.

The most recent data shows that approximately 44,000 people have entered the UK illegally in the year to March 2025, more than 80% through small boat journeys.